1. Technical Field
This invention relates generally to therapy support devices, and more particularly to pelvic therapy support devices.
2. Related Art
Women's health, pelvic support therapy has increased drastically over the past 10 years. Physical therapy has been found to greatly increase the rate of recovery from many symptoms of pelvic floor dysfunction (PFD), including problems with urinary urgency, frequency, or hesitancy, stopping and starting, painful urination, or incomplete emptying, constipation, straining pain with bowel movements, unexplained pain in the lower back, pelvic region, genital area, or rectum, and pain during or after intercourse, for example. The therapy is performed to stretch and massage the pelvic floor. The pelvic floor is a group of muscles that attaches to the front, back, and sides of the pelvis and to the tailbone and sacrum. These muscles support the pelvic organs, including the bladder, uterus or prostate, and rectum, and wrap around the urethra, vagina, and rectum. Coordinated contraction and relaxation of these muscles helps control bladder and bowel function. In patients who have PFD, these muscles may be tight or in spasm, have a combination of tightness and weakness, or have pain-trigger in spots or knots called “trigger points.” Pain brought on from organs, such as the bladder, may set off these muscle problems, but the muscle problems themselves can also set off bladder symptoms. Pain can also result in other muscles, such as in the lower abdomen, lower back, buttocks, thighs, and perineal area, or the pain can be sent from these areas back to the internal organs, contributing to symptoms.
Physical therapy to treat the aforementioned problems can go a long way toward easing the symptoms resulting therefrom. Some well-known physical therapy techniques are performed via external massage and internal pelvic floor massage, which helps relax and lengthen tight pelvic floor muscles and release trigger points. The internal pelvic floor massage includes massaging within the vagina and/or rectum.
Although the various techniques of massage and stimulation, e.g. electrical stimulation, have been proven effective in treating PVD, the therapist and patient are often met with challenges while the therapy is being performed. From the standpoint of both the patient and physical therapist, comfort and fatigue can prove problematic. This results in in large part due to the lack of ability to support the patient in a comfortable position over the duration of the therapy. Further, problems arise for the therapist in that the arm of the therapist often becomes fatigued, also due to the inability to maintain the arm in a comfortable position over the duration of the therapy. Further complicating matters is the variety of patient shapes and sizes. With each patient, a slightly different configuration of support may be needed. Currently, it is common practice to use standard pillows to provide the support to both the patient's legs, while the physical therapist hold their arm in mid-air. Unfortunately, pillows come with several drawbacks, including, to name a few, an inability to reliably support the patient's legs in a comfortable position over the duration of the procedure, having to launder the pillows and/or pillow cases after each use, the tendency for the pillows to absorb contaminants and become stained, having the material within the pillows break-down over time, having to ensure sterility of the pillows prior to use, having the pillows fall from an examination table (plinth) during the procedure, having various, unpredictable firmness's of pillows contributing to unpredictable levels of comfort or discomfort, and having to replace pillows after they become insufficient for continued use.